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18 seats in Northern Ireland of the 659 seats in the House of Commons | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Turnout | 67.4% () | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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The 1997 United Kingdom general election in Northern Ireland was held on 1 May with 18 MPs elected in single-seat constituencies using first-past-the-post as part of the wider general election in the United Kingdom. This was an increase of one seat in Northern Ireland, where the House of Commons as a whole had increased from 650 to 659 seats.
1,177,969 people were eligible to vote, up 53,069 from the 1992 general election. 67.39% of eligible voters turned out, down 2.6 percentage points from the last general election. [1]
The Labour Party led by Tony Blair won a large majority with 418 of 659 seats, returning to office after 18 years of Conservative Party government. In Northern Ireland, Sinn Féin gained two seats, beginning a steady growth in support in elections to the House of Commons.
Less than a year after this election, on 10 April 1998, the Good Friday Agreement was signed, providing for a Northern Ireland Assembly and devolved government through the Northern Ireland Executive.
Party | MPs | Votes | ||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
No. | Change | No. | % | Change | ||
UUP | 10 | 1 | 258,439 | 32.7% | 1.8 | |
SDLP | 3 | 1 | 190,844 | 24.1% | 0.6 | |
Sinn Féin | 2 | 2 | 126,921 | 16.1% | 6.1 | |
DUP | 2 | 1 | 107,348 | 13.6% | 0.5 | |
UK Unionist | 1 | 1 | 12,817 | 1.6% | 1.6 | |
Alliance | 0 | 62,972 | 8.0% | 0.7 | ||
PUP | 0 | 10,934 | 1.4% | 1.4 | ||
NI Conservatives | 0 | 9,858 | 1.2% | 4.5 | ||
NI Women's Coalition | 0 | New | 3,024 | 0.4% | New | |
Workers' Party | 0 | 2,766 | 0.3% | 0.2 | ||
Natural Law | 0 | 2,210 | 0.3% | 0.1 | ||
Green (NI) | 0 | 539 | 0.1% | |||
National Democrats | 0 | New | 81 | New | ||
Independent | 0 | 2,136 | 0.3% | 0.5 | ||
Total | 18 | 1 | 790,889 | 100 |
Constituency | Date | Incumbent | Party | Winner | Party | Cause | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
South Antrim | 21 September 2000 | Clifford Forsythe | UUP | William McCrea | DUP | Death |
The 2001 United Kingdom general election was held on Thursday 7 June 2001, four years after the previous election on 1 May 1997, to elect 659 members to the House of Commons. The governing Labour Party was re-elected to serve a second term in government with another landslide victory with a 167-seat majority, returning 412 members of Parliament versus 418 from the 1997 general election, a net loss of six seats, though with a significantly lower turnout than before—59.4%, compared to 71.6% at the previous election. The number of votes Labour received fell by nearly three million. Tony Blair went on to become the only Labour Prime Minister to serve two consecutive full terms in office. As Labour retained almost all of their seats won in the 1997 landslide victory, the media dubbed the 2001 election "the quiet landslide".
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